The sun is eclipsed by the moon during an annular solar eclipse on the outskirts of Beijing in January, 2010. Grace Liang/ReutersEclipses have long inspired terror and awe as ancient cultures sought ways to explain the celestial phenomenon.“I find the mythology and folklore of eclipses fascinating,” said Mark Littman, a journalism professor at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville and coauthor of “Totality: The Great North American Eclipse of 2024.” “To see how people long ago and people today reacted to a total eclipse of the Sun, a sight so unexpected, so dramatic, so…